Reku's choice to grab the hammer instead of throwing the punch was either proof of his fighting experience or honestly a lucky decision. By grabbing the weapon, which nobody besides Shadic can move in any way, Reku completely stopped his momentum. By doing this, he was able to react to Shadic's ki blinding attack by preventing it altogether.
Reku's counter was shocking to Shadic, as he did not expect his old friend to pull something like that off. To stop the ki blinding, Reku slapped Shadic's wrist. The blast went soaring through the air until it made contact with a rock formation, reducing the earth-made structure to nothing more than a pile of rocks and boulders.
When Reku slapped Shadic's wrist, the hammer-wielding fighter saw an opening. By reaching for and slapping his opponent's wrist, Reku left himself unprepared for and attack. He dropped his hammer, letting the finely crafted smashing device fall to the ground. With his new free hand, Shadic sent a punch towards Reku's ribs and stomach area.
Then, if that connected, Shadic once again fired up and blasted another ki blast, but this time at his opponent. He wanted to use the resulting shockwave to put some much needed space between the two fighters.
Reku was entirely focused on the battle. This was getting fun, and hasn’t fought like this in a long time. He let the hammer fall to the ground, not that he could pick it up anyway. He received a strong punch to the stomach by Shadic, which made him grunt in pain. As the second ki blast came his way, he crossed his arms and blocked it, feeling a sharp sting in them as a result. He dashed towards Shadic once more, intent on keeping the battle close range and fired a flurry of punches to Shadic’s chest area before uppercutting and firing a ki blast to his hopefully exposed torso.
Another attack another hit, Shadic was on a roll today. The battle, while each battler had traded attacks and such, was going surprisingly well. It was not long before Reku recovered and went back on the attack, sending a wave of punches at Shadic. Naturally, because of their slight power difference, Shadic was a bit faster than Reku. To the average naked eye, Reku's flurry of punches was literally unavoidable, but a mixture of muscle memory, experience, and speed allowed Shadic to dodge or block quite a majority of the damage.
The uppercut caught Shadic off guard. He expected Reku's flurry to continue for a little while longer, so in an attempt to block one of the speed punches, Shadic caught a much slower but more powerful punch. His guard was broken, allowing Reku's ki blast to make full contact. The following explosion provided the space Shadic wanted, but at the cost of battle momentum.
He landed on the top of a stone pillar which gave him a brief moment to look at his situation. After all the blocking he'd been doing, Shadic's arms ached. Unfortunately, his gut was in worse shape. The attack Reku lead with, while rather cheeky, did a good job in handicapping the hybrid. However, now was not the time for Shadic to feel sorry for himself. Any sign of weakness would be used against him.
'More dodging, keep the distance, end this sooner than later. I haven't been able to train with somebody of this power so my endurance is way below par.' Shadic went over his gameplan and devised a few tactics for his next attack. Reku seemed to be taking this fight more than seriously, and losing was not even on his mind. If Shadic did not adopt the same mindset, he was not going to win.
To get back into the battle he fired a few ki blasts at Reku before calling his hammer over. Shadic was ready to play a game of cat and mouse.
Reku was already on the offensive once more, with the adrenaline pumping through his body numbing the pain. This was exciting him a great deal, though this does not mean his body was not taking damage at all. He fired multiple ki blasts at the stone column in order to keep Shadic on his toes. He saw the multiple ki blasts hurling themselves towards Reku’s direction and he had to act fast. He fired is own ki blasts to collide with his opponent’s, forming a cloud of smoke in between the two fights. However, it wasn’t too long before Reku burst through the smoke feigning a punch before blinking directly below him. With this, he would attempt to pull Shadic’s body down using his leg before shooting up with a punch to his jaw. If this succeeded, Reku would repeatedly throw a few punches in the same spot before backing off.
“Come on Shadic, where’s that power!” Reku asked, demanding more of a fight. “Are you sure you don’t want to transform? Might put a little more fight in you.”
Shadic saw the ki blasts headed towards him, but they were a bit too low to hit him. That's when he realized they weren't aimed at him, but rather, the landform he was standing on. As Shadic took to the air, the rocks crumbled, making another pile in the wasteland. Reku stopped the ki blasts headed his way with his own, creating a large smokescreen.
'Wait for it...' Shadic knew Reku was about to do something, and before long, his opponent burst through the smoke ready to attack. As Reku neared, Shadic charged a ki blast in his hand, but before he could fire, Reku disappeared. It was the infamous blink surprise attack, but because of his new plan of action, Shadic didn't stick around to try a counter attack. He took off in the air, flying full speed ahead as Reku tried to grab him. Either Reku could try to hold on or let go and chase, but Shadic needed to keep his distance for at least a little while.
"The no transformation rule I put in place is more of a benefit to you than it is to me, trust me on that one." He shouted back as he maneuvered through the wasteland. He was being a little passive in this fight for now because he was still trying to read Reku. Clearly he was on the aggressive 99.9% of the time and wouldn't let up, so Shadic either had to try to be more aggressive or keep up his passiveness until he had a clear cut opportunity.
"Pfft. Whatever." Reku replied, unable to grab him and instead running away. He would've went after him, but why waste the stamina? "Since you want to play it like a coward, let's kick it up a notch." He said, putting his hands by his waist with a determinded look on his face. Anyone who has trained with Roshi would know this technique all too well. A blue light would form in his hands and it would slowly get bigger and more powerful. "Ka...Me.."
Shadic noticed that Reku did not chase, but rather began charging a technique; the Kamehameha Wave (possibly super) to be exact. This was the moment he had been waiting for and he knew it was time to possibly put this battle away. A beam struggle would favor Shadic, but it would not be easy.
He too put his hands near his waist and began charging up an attack. Shadic also knew the signature attack of the Turtle School and planned on putting it to use. "Ka...me..." A blue orb of energy slowly formed in between his two hands and started growing in size. The blue orbs each fighter was charging were so bright that they drowned out the light from the sun. Everything around them seemed to grow dimmer, making the wasteland seem more empty than before.
"Ha...me..." The blue orb in his hansds grew even stronger and brighter. As Reku saw Shadic charging his own Kamehameha wave, he could see where this was going. A clash between the two fighters used a lot of energy and Reku knew that a beam struggle would probably result in him losing. Even if he won, he would've used so much energy that he would not able to go on any further and still pull off a victory. He had to think of something fast before it was too late.
Shadic kept up his charging as well, "ha..me..." He ran down some scenarios in his mind. Either the two were going to have a beam clash, which Shadic would likely win from power alone, or somebody was going to break away and try to get in close while the other is vulnerable. If Reku tried that, there would be little for Shadic to do, mostly because he was already getting worn down from the pressure Reku applied earlier.
If the combat did return to close range, Shadic needed to do something. The whole running away thing was, while smart, not exactly his style. It seemed like a cop out, and everybody knows Shadic does not like to run from a fight. If the combat did go back to the melee side of things, there was one thing that could swing the tide of battle in Shadic's favor. It was working early on, but that was really the only time he used it, it being his hammer. Working that into his combos and battle strategy would likely give Shadic the edge he needed to finish this fight. He had to counter aggression with aggression, and that was his new strategy assuming this beam struggle did not happen.
"HA!" Reku screamed as he thrusted his hands forward ferociously and the blue beam would shine brightly as he fired...a dud. The light would flash, but then disappear. Reku had tried to bait Shadic into firing his, and if he had, while he was firing the beam he would fly under it and use blink to close the gap faster. If he made it to him, he would fire a flurry of punches at Shadic's face and knee him in the stomach, and then in the face.